


You Ran Away April, May, And June And When You Came Back, I Was Over The Moon

by Velocity_Owl87



Category: Football RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Future, Bookstores, Coffee Shops, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Estrangement, Hopeful Ending, Implied Relationships, Multi, Reconciliation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-08
Updated: 2016-11-08
Packaged: 2018-08-29 19:53:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8503207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Velocity_Owl87/pseuds/Velocity_Owl87
Summary: Stevie and Xabi haven't spoken in years and Stevie has resigned himself to never repairing that bridge ever again. That is until he goes into a bookstore on a whim and runs into the last person he ever expected to see in Liverpool-Xabi Alonso. Now he has two choices-To run away and continue to regret the past, or to step up and finally make it right.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I have just accepted that these two are my OTP and one of these days they're going to be coaching together somewhere. I like the idea of having reconciliations happen even though estrangements maybe hard to overcome, so this was created out of that. It does have a pseudo, quasi basis in RL, yet is not completely based on RL. 
> 
> Title is from Matthew Barber's "And You Give" and it has been proofed, but if errors remain they will be fixed.

Stevie wanted to get out of the house. That was the only reason why he was in that store, browsing through things that he only had a slight interest in. Even though the girls were away on a much insisted on family visit, the house felt suffocating somehow. Like the weight of unspoken arguments and recriminations were hanging in the air, waiting for them to continue once the combatants were back in place. He couldn’t take the silence and the coldness any longer. So he left. 

He had wandered all over town, getting himself a cup of overpriced coffee from Starbucks when he realised he hadn’t really eaten or drank anything. He drank it down, not really tasting it and chucked the cup into the rubbish bin before he entered Waterstone’s. It wasn’t really his scene, but he welcomed the distraction all the same. Besides, it wasn’t as if he had anywhere to really be and books were always a good distraction.

Stevie moved past the expensive and flashy hardbacks towards the classics. He wasn’t really keen on new books and found the classics more to his taste. So he moved towards the back and started to mindlessly browse, some of the titles making him smile slightly. They all had some kind of memory connected to them. Particularly the collection of Donne’s poems that were right in front of him.

He felt his breath hitch as he looked at the spine and dim memories of a mussed up bed and a long body lying beside him, laughing softly as he recalled one of the poems he had had to learn when he had been in secondary. The dim memory of soft hazel eyes assaulted him, making him need to lean on the bookshelves in an effort to catch his breath. 

Stevie pushed the memory away with effort and resolutely looked at other books on a different shelf. That was not a place that he wanted to go at this point in time and resolutely forced himself to look at other books  He hoped that by looking at the bright colours of the books he would get lulled into a different set of memories and leave those that were still too painful to examine, settle. He touched the spines of the other books, reading the titles and looking at the blurbs in the back, hoping one of them would jump out of him. He wasn’t really in the market for books, but this place was open and it felt right to go in and just explore. Besides, it wouldn’t hurt to occupy his mind with something else, even if it was a fictional world. It would be better than sitting around brooding.

He was still browsing when he noticed another patron doing the same at the end of the section that he was looking through. He noted the nice wool coat and the fancy trousers almost absent-mindedly. The soft ginger brown of a nice haircut and the pleasant face below it was noted with the same detached disinterest. There was something about the other patron. Something painfully familiar, but what exactly, he couldn’t quite put his finger on.

It was still gnawing at him what he noticed when the patron backed up and accidentally knocked a book off of the display behind him. Stevie looked up sharply at the sound and watched as the other patron picked up the book and put it back on the shelf. He turned back to his own browsing and it was then that Stevie felt his face heat up and a cold pit open up in his stomach as he realised who it was that was standing there. 

Xabi Alonso.

After all those years...All that distance… And Xabi Alonso was here in the same bookstore as he was, browsing as if the world hadn’t suddenly turned and tilted on its axis. 

Stevie turned back and looked at the books. Touched some of them and pretended to look at them as he felt his blood course hot and cold under his skin, which felt hot and slightly swollen as he tried to figure out what to do next. He could pretend that he was done there and go back to the Starbuck’s and feel like an utter knob for not talking to Xabi again. He could do that and chalk up yet another notch on his page of regrets and let it cut him over and over again. Have it cut into his soul again and let the wound get deeper with no respite.

Or he could suck it all up: His hurt pride, his loneliness, his stubbornness and try and rebuild the bridge that Xabi hadn’t kept repaired, but that he himself had completely torched to blackened splinters. Even though Stevie knew that things would either end up horribly or end up with possibility of a truce and a rebuilding of what had been a once promising relationship between them.

He could extend the olive branch and finally end that cycle once and for all. He had that choice right now and he could either remain quiet, or he could finally talk to him and explain.Explain why he had withdrawn and why he had let their relationship lapse. Why he hadn’t been able to give Xabi what he wanted and needed at that time. Explain why it had seemed so important at that time and was nothing more than dust in the cold light of day and maturity. 

He could do that and hope for the best, even though he was sure that his insides had turned to water as he debated what he needed to do next.

Stevie wasn’t going to pretend that he was a brave man. Sure, he was supposed to be big and hard. He had built up the reputation of being just that. Except that most of the time, he usually ended up showing up with his face burning up and his body fluctuating between hot and cold as he went through with what he was supposed to do. All the while hoping that it would somehow turn out well. 

Most of the time, it did. 

Yet the excruciating time between action and outcome was what always made it harder than it was supposed to be in the end. 

He was tempted to walk out without Xabi Alonso noticing him, as had been his first instinct. He was sure that he would have been able to get away with it, since Xabi Alonso was engrossed in the book he had picked up from the shelf. The one that had caused him to bump into the display copy he had knocked over in the first place. 

But Stevie knew that despite the impulse, that wasn’t what he was going to do. 

Not after all the years of silence between them. The misses and the never really connecting even though Stevie  _ knew _ he was the one to open that line of communication. The nights of staying up and keeping company with his ghosts and his regrets weighed heavily on him the older he got. He was tired of carrying that needless burden any longer. He couldn’t do it. He couldn’t leave when the perfect opportunity had practically fallen in his lap.

After all those years of never coming across Xabi until now, he knew that this was it. The opportunity he needed to finally make it right. He had to take it. There was no way that he was going to miss this shot.

It was then that he steeled himself and exhaled quietly. He could do this. He could talk to Xabi Alonso. They had been close once. More than close, if he was being truthful. He could do this. He could so do this.

Telling himself this, he turned and walked towards Xabi Alonso. 

“Xabi. Xabi Alonso.”

Xabi Alonso frowned slightly, confused at who was calling his name when he finally looked up and his entire face brightened in surprise and a hint of happiness at the sight before him.

“Stevie? Stevie Gerrard! Wow. Hello.”

It was the same voice, a tad lower with age, the same warm hazel eyes that Stevie remembered from years back. The same warm smile. 

It was as if he was seeing him for the first time, except not. TIme had moved on for the both of them. Stevie could see that now that he took a closer look at Xabi.

The years though, had been kind despite leaving their marks on him. There were more lines at the corners of his eyes and his skin was just a bit more weathered with more stubble than Stevie ever remembered him having. His hair was a bit lighter, and there were a few threads of grey here and there. 

Stevie wondered what he looked like to Xabi. He knew that he had also changed, his sorrows and rough patches having had left their mark on him. He hoped he didn’t look as wrecked as he had the last time that they had set eyes on each other. But from the soft smile on Xabi’s lips and the attentive way that he was looking at Stevie made that speculation go away. 

“It’s been awhile. What brings you to Liverpool?”

Xabi shrugged at the question as he looked down at the book he was still holding and put it back. He looked up at Steven and despite wanting to school his features, he failed.  A look of longing followed by a look of wistfulness crossed his face before he finally answered. It made Stevie’s heart hurt when he saw his expression and saw that it wasn’t just him that had lived with regret and hurt. It also made him wonder if Xabi also had soft smudged memories of late nights and of the two of them sharing a bed that was too small for them.

“Couldn’t stay away. And you? Are you back for good?”

Stevie’s throat worked as he tried to shape what he had been wanting to say to Xabi for all those years of silence between them. All the conversations that he had rehearsed all those years had left him and he fell back onto the tried and true to buy some time and gather his wits.

“It’s...It’s a long story and one that you deserve to know. Do you have time for coffee?”

Xabi looked at his phone and nodded. 

“I do. There’s a Starbucks right next to the shop. Is that alright?”

Stevie nodded and he swore his breath was taken away when he saw that close lipped smile spread wide across Xabi’s lips. He had missed seeing that expression, Stevie realised as they walked to the Starbucks. Missed that and being close to him and hearing his voice. He couldn’t say all of that just yet and kept the conversation light and non consequential as they got their drinks and finally sat down. 

Xabi put his coffee down and leaned forward to look closely at Stevie. His hands wrapped themselves around his cup and he waited for Stevie to answer the question.

Stevie looked down briefly at the table, Xabi’s hands, the cup, before he finally look at Xabi’s eyes.

“I was done running from the past, so I decided to come home.”

Xabi’s eyes went a soft brown at that. 

“Was it-”

Stevie shook his head. “No. It was never that. Or you. I can promise you that.”

Xabi lifted his cup to his lips and drank his coffee, giving both of them time to gather their thoughts.

“It wasn’t you and I should have told you that years ago.”

Xabi sat back and looked at Stevie sharply. 

“You don’t have to if it will hurt you, Stevie.”

Stevie shook his head and met Xabi’s gaze head on. 

“It’s going to hurt, but I still want to.  Like I said before: You deserve to know.”

Xabi’s mouth curved into a sad half smile. 

Stevie nodded to himself, looked away just for a fraction of a moment. 

“It was in May. The year after Istanbul and you remember-”

END.


End file.
